Activity 1.1.2

Fish With Nature's Antifreeze

Materials (for each group of 3/4 students):

• test tube and holder
• 600 ml beaker or glass jar
• test tube (approx. 20 by 150 mm)
• goggles
• alcohol burner
• water
• laboratory balance/lab scale
• stir rod
• sodium thiosulfate (common photographer's hypo)
• Activity 1.1.2 Student Worksheet
  

Procedure:
It doesn't take much to start the freezing process. Read through the entire procedure and predict what will happen.

Prediction:

1. Place 2 ml water in test tube.
   
2. Weigh out 15 grams of sodium thiosulfate and put 4 crystals in the water in the test tube.
   
3. Create a saturated solution at room temperature, stirring and adding more crystals until no more will dissolve.
   
4. Gently heat the solution, adding the remaining crystals until all have been dissolved in the test tube. Be sure that no undissolved bits of sodium thiosulfate remain in the test tube.
   
5. Place the test tube in a beaker of cool water so the solution can cool to room temperature without moving.
   
6. When the solution still is as clear as water but the test tube feels cool to the touch, you have created a supersaturated solution. This solution is a liquid at a temperature below where it normally becomes a solid.
   
7. Carefully lift the test tube out of the beaker of water and feel the temperature of the lower half of the tube.
   How does it feel?
   
   
8. Drop one crystal of sodium thiosulfate into the test tube and watch what happens. Feel the temperature of the lower half of the test tube as the change takes place. Record your observations.
   
   

Conclusions:

Did this investigation support your original prediction? ___________

If not, how was it different?

Student Worksheet #1.1.2

• Back to Table of Contents.
• Back to Activity 1.1.2.